Author: Mossy Bog

Why you crazy talkin’ cyclone boy! Get your hair out of the soup bowl! For the love of God, why can’t you tie it back? Just to spite me of course. That’s why! Cyclone boy pushed his chair back from the table and got up. He went into the living room and laid down on the old red and black checkered carpet and rolled around. Damnit, momma thought. I did it again. The reason I got mad is cause I wanted him to eat his soup properly and now i ruined it again cause now he got up and left the table, and now if I say come back to the table he won’t cause I am the one who drove him off in the first place. Now it’s all ruined yet again. I have to figure out how to deal with these situations without getting upset. Time and time again, I tell myself that and then I up and do it again. Oh Jesus, Mary and Joseph.

Momma reflected some more, staring at the half full bowl of tomato soup on the table and cyclone boy in the background, rolling around on the carpet in the dim light of the crusty old living room lamp. Outside the pain the ass dog from next door was barking again. Such a terrible creature, that one. The owner should find a holistic vet and take that dog out of it’s doldrums, momma thought. She had once thought about a career in veterinary science, but dropped out after two years. She got too far behind because she insisted on reading every word of all the text books. “Well, isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?” she had squawked at her daughter when Lucy had tried to tell her mama she needed to skim over some parts. That’s how you do it. You gotta skim here and there, and just take in the general notion of the content, otherwise, you won’t be able to catch up, Lucy had told her. “And so’s I’m not supposed to know what I’m doing and then end up killing someone’s pet kitty by mistake?”

Lucy gave up but Momma did eventually drop out of school without getting her degree and now here she was with Lucy’s son Cyclone Boy rolling around on the carpet and a barely touched bowl of tomato soup across from her on the table. The smell of the soup made her think of that one time they had been staying in a yurt for the summer. It was on some land donated to a friend of the family from the Tortoise Bread Company when they went out of business once everyone went gluten free. They had a silo full of wheat and no sales, and they liquidated everything by donating it to employees and their families.

The yurt was right outside of St Joseph Missouri and they got there by floating down the Missouri River from Omaha. They had a couple rafts tied together with rope and some plastic furniture scattered about. Cyclone Boy was just a baby then, about one year old, Momma thought, as he had just learned to walk and was wandering over the other side of the raft and walked right into the river. Lucy’s boyfriend at the time, Max, who was incidentally not Cyclone Boy’s Dad, stood on deck drinking a bottle of beer and yelled out, “Hey you’re boy’s gone into the river.” Momma leapt up and jumped in the water and pulled out the child who had been lying there face down in the water, but only for a few seconds.

Well, after the shouts and recriminations subsided, they ended up at the land the yurt was on and rowed the boat ashore. They unpacked and set up a little cook stove and all they had to make was tomato soup, so that’s what they had for supper that night. I’m sure there was crackers as well, Momma thought. There must have been crackers.

The next morning they hopped out of their sleeping bags and headed down to Contrary Lake to wash themselves and clean up. They had planned the trip a while ago when Lucy was pregnant with Cyclone Boy and now they had finally seen it to fruition and they were giddy and glad as they bathed in the lake beneath the huge piles of cracked wheat situated by the lakeshore.
This is what Momma remembered as she sat at the table and felt sorry for herself. She got a hold of her feelings and called out gently to Cyclone Boy, I’m going to warm this soup back up and you come up here and have you some. She took the bowl to the kitchen and dumped its contents back in the soup pot. Cyclone Boy crawled up to the table and sat down, tying his long stringy hair back with a simple black elastic band. Momma brought him the soup and some ham and cheese on a plate and they ate their supper in peace.

the handwritten note in the cookbook said “make something healthy and good. miss you terribly.” Had it been her cookbook, this obviously would have triggered some memories and feelings perhaps of the person who dedicated these words to her, to accompany the gift of the book. She rifled through the pages going from soups and appetizers toward the middle of the book where the more substantive meals were deconstructed into their separate parts, and then straight to the back where the index was and the tail end of the dessert section. She did a quick glance at the index for garbanzo beans, and, seeing none, she turned back a couple pages to the “c’s” to see if perhaps they were listed under chickpeas. And yes, there was one entry, for an appetizer dish called pureed chickpea lettuce wraps with truffle oil and roasted pumpkin seeds. Hmm, didn’t sound half bad. 

meg had bought the book, as far as her she could remember, at a used bookstore in Champaign, Illinois, while on a road trip back in her early twenties. This was a customary activity back then for her and her friends, just jump in the car and go. “Which way we headin’?” one would ask. “Who the fuck knows?” another would answer, and off they would drive, laughing down the road. This particular trip must have been 1982 or so and they ended up crisscrossing almost the entire state of Illinois. Late one night they pulled off the highway at a place called Burnt Prairie and, it being rather pleasant out, they found a spot and unfurled their sleeping bags on the ground. When they awake in the muted dawn sunlight, they were surrounded by stray dogs who had, unbenownst to them, arrived sometime during the night and plopped down among the four young women.

they slowly awoke, yawning and stretching their arms out, except for meg who was always the last one up. the dogs awoke too wagging their tails in delight. who knows from whence they had come, these stray dogs of Burnt Prairie. Meg was the person who stayed asleep as long as possible, like there was a magnet in the mattress and a piece of iron in her abdomen. She tried to visualize herself as someone who awoke at sunrise and jumped out of bed gleefully. She really did try, for a while, to be that person, but it didn’t happen and after a while she accepted it. later that day at the bookstore, after giving the dogs some cans of spam that melissa happened to have tucked away in her backpack, they sleepily shuffled through books and old postcards. this was the best part of these trips thought meg, finding stores like this and looking through items from the past. she loved the old photos and postcards and used books of course, but also the bizarre looking kitchen items from days gone by, like an old breadbox, decorations and adornments from 1950’s homes, like orange ashtrays and costume jewelry, she loved all of that stuff.

the cookbook she ended up buying, the one with the inscription, was called Corn Soufflé and Other Beach Party favorites. the inscription wasn’t signed and there was no name on the book, but the copyright said 1953, and the book itself smelled faintly of the ocean, or perhaps Lake Michigan, although they would surely have different smells, the ocean being salt water and the Great Lakes not so. So she sniffed closer and tried to discern whether there was any sodium traces in the fifty year old aroma. there was a stain on page 19, orange/reddish it could have been some variety of tomato-based sauciness, and the yellowish stain on page 90 may well have been the much touted corn soufflé.

make something healthy and good, the inscription had said, and meg continued inventing scenarios in her head of who wrote that to whom. the car barreled southward toward Cairo. The plan was to spend the night there before heading back up north to Melissa’s house in Freeport. It was going to be a long ride and they still wanted to stop and see the Cahokia mounds on the way. meg looked at the recipes, planning to dedicate some time to making a meal or two after they got back home, as she fell asleep in the back of the car heading down I-57.

One of the things you will note about our company is that nothing we do or say makes any sense at all. That does not prevent us, at all, from being a market leader in data services, risk and compliance, actionable solutions, intelligent workflows, end to end solutions and private wealth management , per se. Our global footprint encompasses 41 countries and includes industries as diverse as strategy induction processes, as well as point to point human delivery mechanics. When you go throughout your normal daily life, you will, on average, interact with one of our services or products an average of 3.2 times each minute. Our shareholder derivative measure is equal to the total hemispheric load in salts and minerals during the entire year.

Your private data will never be sold. We keep it ourselves and use it against you whenever and wherever needed. Our encrypted subterranean management stronghold can withstand the force equivalent of three nuclear wars and seven zombie apocalypses. There is nothing you can do or say that we don’t already know about. Our products keep you safe, calm and unobtrusively compliant. If there is ever an issue, you are welcome to message our service desk.

Perhaps you are wondering if another future is possible, if another desired reality, or the perception of such, can come to be seen; If progress can be halted, if the word progress can be changed to reflect more accurately the meaning of the word, the significance of the actions contained in such a lexiconic signifier. Of course you are welcome to do as you wish in your private world, by yourself, in your own space, but anything public belongs to us, including any and all communication channels except for one. Do not attempt to disembark while the coach is moving. Oh, you are, of course, free to be yourself.

Some nights, it’s hard. Nincompoops go by in their heavy duty trucks, for no other reason than to go on by. The trucks don’t haul anything or even other family members. It’s a lone man’s business, the big heavy truck. A response perhaps, to the uncertainty and, perhaps, perceived feminization of the modern age; A machine made to withstand actual physical military attack, if needed.  But, why would one expect to be targeted by weapons these days? Is it fear of a black planet, or the women threatening to take over the man’s domain. Well, if they do, the thinking may go, I still have my truck. And it’s big, black, and way up high so I can look down upon everyone else, and see them coming before they get to me.

Trucks have evolved over the years just like everything else. It is believed they mutated from the whale, the blue whale in fact, when the whales emerged from the oceans millions of years ago, grew a tail and some little webbed feet. They didn’t get past the beach for the first million years or so. They had to wait til the feet grew and mobility became possible. By this time they had turned black because of the constant sun exposure. Their complex whale songs slowly slipped from their memories and were replaced, eventually, by a low engine hum and the dinging noise of the no seatbelt warning.

Once the new creatures were mobile enough, they could chase down food and survive on land. The mutation from their whale ancestors was now complete. Their feet morphed into rubber tires, getting rounder and rounder with each new evolutionary update. They built roads to benefit their own mobility. They learned how to suck old dead plants out of the earth to make themselves strong. They learned to grow bigger cabs, bigger beds, bigger tires, enormous structures with room enough for much and many, but, as stated, psychologically suited for the lone man, face hidden behind a ball cap visor and sunglasses, stoic look on his face. No empathy or understanding or feeling of communion evident in the presence of the lone men.

They are not needed within the confines of the truck cab, where no other creature shall enter, friend or foe. It is a solitary vessel, and they ride, alone, like a monkey or a dog in a primitive spacecraft, testing the effect of atmospheric pressure on the ears. They move forward down the road, with no other intention or purpose than to keep moving on. The lone man, on his mission of mystery, does not glance at you as he moves on by.

HMS maverick was the ship’s name and, according to the map, they were about 300 miles from Maryland. The beauty of the mauve sky made the ship’s crew manage their tasks with gaiety and without malice.

As they drew closer, the shoreline shimmered magically on the horizon, the very tops of the maples blurry and matted. Master Mapo, the captain’s first mate, made the rounds and uncoiled a rope that was mangled, perhaps due to the bite marks of a man o war.

Mapo had married in Mali at a young age, but, since then, had managed to relocate and make his way as a ship’s mate. It was a good match, except for the manic work and persistent meals of manioc. Mapo wouldn’t let those malodorous meals mar his experience. No.

As the Maverick floated in towards Maryland, the crew deftly managing the sails on the mast, manatees floating beside the ship in the mashing of the waves. A mandarin orange was unpeeled and masticated as the Maverick maneuvered into the bay. The map marked where the camp known as New Manchester lied just ahead past the mangroves.

Maybe they’d see the mystical manager in person, the maven of this little peninsula. Magically craggy rocks maintained the channel for maritime transport. Manchesterians made a living making and exporting maple syrup. It was marvelous.

Sally lay down in the field after a long day of picking and pruning. The sun was setting and the crows finally started to head of home, cackling all the way. She looked forward to the peace and quiet, figuring she’d have about twenty minutes of silent reverie as the sun set and the crows flew off. Many of them, in fact, had already headed back to the city for the winter, as the crops were getting hauled in.

Such a magical time, it helped her to recover, spiritually, from a long day of hard work. Physical recovery would have to wait until she had her bath and laid down in bed to recuperate, a bit of peace and quiet before falling asleep and beginning anew once again.

This was back during an epoch when farms were individual homes, lands worked by a family and maybe a couple of other fellas from time to time. Back before things went in a different direction, back before corn and soybeans.

The placid river looks appealing enough, flowing nice and easy through the hilly knobs on either shore, curtailing around the bend westward, perhaps. But around that turn, just out of sight, there is a situation. The water enters into a zone of enhanced reality, a transformed ecosphere where Sally would not be comfortable laying in the grass. The grass, here, is not really grass, after all. One won’t sense that smell of moist old logs, the murmurings of crinkling leaves scattered by the breeze.

The crows are not here in this zone, having successfully resisted the chip implants that were guaranteed to enhance the essence of their lives, to make their dark feathers even blacker and sleeker, to make their cackles even more sonically rhythmic and audacious, their sense of smell enhanced with signal extenders to more easily track dead squirrels, fast food containers, and other food sources.

The crows consulted and decided against the offer and flew off to the city and other more remote areas where they could maintain their traditional crowiness. Sally watched them as they reached their decision after counting the votes. The crops and the fruit trees, they went down a different road, having been drawn in to the appealing offer of a fungus-free future (FFF). Their leaves were tagged with RF tags, each one a separate identifier with Bluetooth GPS geo-location antenna-free maintenance. The stalks and trunks injected with a special blend of FFF formula (FFFF), and the roots tied in to the inter-zone sub-strata micro-fiber monitoring system. Moisture and soil quality are automatically adjusted, sun and wind exposure engineered for precise precision outputs.

Sally had received glossy mailers attached to her doorknob every morning, soliciting her participation in the fungus-free future formula fund (FFFFF). The company already had enough money to pay for the entire operation of course, but their consultants had argued that with monetary buy-in from the community, the people would “own it” themselves, and thus feel more beholden to the company and less-resistant to the imposition of the enhancements. The fund was a big success with its solicitations, and even provided the money for a lavish company Christmas party every year. Sally went to one once, but left early.

But the income generated by the FFFFF was a drop in the bucket compared to the revenue generated from the corn and soybean seed growth expansion. Every field that was already cleared was quickly eradicated of what had been growing there before, and replaced with the perfectly-matched corn seeds for that particular soil. Bordering lots were treated the same and planted through drone-guided precision with the appropriate soybean seed synchronization (SSS).

And while those fields were being planted, other lands were cleared; timber was uprooted, boulders cleared, slopes flattened, applications applied and ultra-sonic scans taken and studied for ultimate planting optimization. Each plant pre-installed with the RF tracker chip, communicating moisture, sun, soil and fungus information. Each farmer waiting for the computer to process the data and to export it to his machinery, as long as he was paid up on his soybean seed synchronization subscription (SSSS).

The fruit trees were putting out fruit like nobody’s business, and it was all great looking fruit, perfectly, round, shiny and very firm, built to last for weeks after being picked, bug-resistant, fungus-resistant, indestructible shiny orbs filling every growth node on every chemically-controlled branch. Some trees were proud. They felt strong and more productive than ever. Other, more sensitive deciduous beings, felt somehow sad, depressed, angry, self-alienated. Their fruit all looked the same, as it was, of course, fungus-free futures formula fertilized fruit (FFFFFF), and they missed the variety, the differences and variations. They even went so far as to miss the worms and bugs. They even missed the pesky crows who had abused them all these years.

But what could they do? There was no going back, really, unless they waited for many generations yet to come. But hidden in Sally’s garden were a few old gnarly stalks, wild plants that grew where they felt most at home, where they fit in best with the others. The old tall oaks and cottonwoods letting enough light in to reach the little saplings down below. The wild ginger pungent in the morning sun. Little field mice streaking through the underbrush in search of tasty treats.

Your mom was here last night

whored out with her spiky crown

I’d seen her standing there proud all these years

looks like she finally gave up and came down

You were due, i told her, cause if you were 

born there with jimmy and josephine and dexter

You wouldn’t come back

unless you were made to

Unless you were sold

Sold for a fifty dollar bill and a panama hat

Mr. Knickerbocker said that’s that, and put

you out there to stay

like an intern, except he didn’t bring you back

Just left you out there cause

There was no end date

Your value depreciated, no longer worthwhile

Your corn palace not yet erected

Your ball of twine still yet to come 

Next time you come down, make sure

that you call ahead. No one is sure

what you will do next

when you come to get your things

I’ll have them ready for you. Not

on the curb because that is too tawdry.

but inside the house

You can come in and give me a hug

Before you go. 

Way out west, the fire burns low. Not like before, when it was a roaring blaze for weeks and weeks. No, not at all. Since then, it has dissipated quite a bit, due to the scarcity of fuel. It seemed to have started on a remote patch of forest, one of those places you might come across out of the blue, where, inexplicably, there are dozens of kitchen appliances, old ones, abandoned and dumped out there in the woods for some reason. That’s where the fire started, in one of those ovens.

Somebody had come by one morning and put in a blueberry pie, turned it up to 400 degrees, set the timer for 45 minutes, and left. Who was it? Nobody knows. An old hermit, perhaps, or a young urbanite out for a hike, with an ultra-sleek Yeti water bottle in one hand and a yet to be baked blueberry pie in the other. Whoever it was, and here’s the weird part, didn’t know the oven existed, had no idea it was going to be there. They just happened to have the pie in one hand when coming down the hill and finding the odd assortment of old kitchen appliances out there in the woods.

“Well, everything happens for a reason”, the mystery person thought, before putting the pie in the oven. Did they wait for it to preheat, or just slide it in at once? No one knows. No one else was there.

An assortment of songbirds, perched on the branches surrounding the clearing, gazed down at the scene, like some scene out of a Franciscan Gospel. There must have been magic in the air because there certainly wasn’t electricity. The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PGE) had long ago abandoned the grid, and even back then, before the virus hit, when there was a grid, it didn’t come close to reaching anywhere around here.

However, the oven worked, and the pie started baking, and the forest air was infused with the smell of dough, sugar, the melting berries, the spices. I think a note of ginger was detected, cinnamon, but, thank God, no nutmeg. Anyway, it was all pleasant enough for a while, but then the mood turned. The person, it seems, if there had ever been a person, left after putting the pie in the oven. They just kept walking. So, we know, or at least we think we know, that the person themselves, if there was a person at all, was not the source of the energy that powered the oven., because after they left, the pie kept cooking.

Then, it started to burn, because when you cook something, it has to be heated up for a certain period of time and then that process needs to end. I know this sounds obvious, because it is, but back when they were baking the first pies, this all had to be figured out, the baking time and such. They didn’t even have thermometers, I don’t think, or timers either, so how could they even figure it out at all, could they?

So, the pie burst into flames eventually. As did the oven and the other discarded kitchen appliances, and the trees and plants, and the molds, mosses and fungi, even the rocks and the dirt. It all burned and burned until there was nothing left, and then the fire smoldered for a long while and eventually went out.